Day 1…

The last… eight hours were… both uneventful and eventful… on one hand, it was mostly just the kobolds training, learning bits of lore about the world, him teaching some techniques, Kaide force feeding others poisonous mushrooms… which is arguably not unreasonable…. It also involves him learning that Aenirus can probably solo everyone in the room if she so wishes to, her age is way higher than he thought and a cute critter serpent being automatically claimed… Also Tier, Hraeta and an unnamed Flying Kanid fighting off a big ass serpent with venom and gaining a bunch of new blueprints. Speaking of…

You now have access to the blueprint(s): basic slam trap, basic tripwire (vine), tough tripwire (vine), basic twig javelin, fire-hardened twig javelin, arm bracers (scaled leather + bone), Grass Serpent (grass snake)

‘okay, the kobolds seem to be busy making stuff and I even gained a new critter, oh there is that critter serpent there, how cute… I wish I could just boop its snoot… no hands at all though… also that giant more murderous looking danger noodle that they dragged in’ Tier thought as he finished manually absorbing the giant serpent.

You now have access to the pattern:

Greater Cave Serpent (a greater version of the regular venomous cave Serpent that gained extra size and general improvements overall, Cave Serpents live in caves and can hunt prey double their size though their venom is powerful enough to down a human in just under 10 seconds without antidote or when there is no poison resistance, its effects are greatly reduced even by poison resistance)

Base Stats:

Strength - 41

Perception - 25

Endurance - 36

Dexterity - 11

Intelligence - 6

Wisdom - 11

Charisma - 10

Creativity - 9

Destiny - 12

Mysticism - 13

Karma - 4

Willpower – 19

Traits: Infrared vision (allow sight on certain types of infrared lights; 250m range), Venom (deadly enough to down a biped in one bite, gets nullified hard by any sort of poison resistance though), Poison immunity

Skills: Sudden Strike (lv.3) (allow the user to suddenly strike its victim with a short windup); Intimidation (lv.6) (allow the user to intimidate opponents into inaction, pits the user’s and opponent’s respective willpower against each other); Poison spray (lv.2) (the user sprays out the poison it creates towards an enemy, usefulness depends on the poison; 30 second cooldown)

Abilities: Stealth (lv.5) (allow user to better hide or move without notice); Blunt resistance (lv.1) (reduces damage from blunt weaponry or attacks)

“it’s a good pattern, lots of thing I can do with it… but what did I told you about no fighting?” Tier said sternly at the still pale Kaide “it ambushed us, w-” Hraeta tried to defend “no, it was my fault for not looking hard enough, I am a disgrace as a leader…” Kaide cut her off instantly “as I said, I am not fit to ser-” “shut it” Tier said coldly shutting Kaide up immediately “now that your self-doubt session has been cut short, I would like to say a couple of words… two in particular… good job” if Tier (still)had a thumb he would raise it up with that sentence.

“what?” Kaide let out accidentally in confusion “yup, I’m actually proud of how you handled that situation, you realized your mistakes, acted immediately avoiding a one-sided bad situation and even managed to outsmart your… obviously non-intelligent foe but still, I could not ask for a better commander under me” Tier responded “you should be proud of your accomplishments and not look at badly at the past failures, those always lead to degradation not improvements” Aenirus added.

“you did well against a threat rank 4 to 5 creature that can instantly down any of you.. though you do have poison resistance I would guess that it was not nice fighting under the influence of poison” Aenirus cheered “I personally think that you picked one of the best way to handle that situation, the bite in the beginning only landing because you protected your companion from almost certain incapacitation which would’ve made the situation worse” Tier also commented

“what’s this ranking stuff?” one of the kobolds Galdra asked “come on, the ranking system is common knowledge to bipeds like you guys who was born in a dungeon… that has less than 5 floors … and picked up its common sense…” the thought just occurred to her “yeah… I should have explained this a bit earlier…” she realized her situation and went into a temporary stupor.

“Aenirus? Are you there? Hello?” Tier asked to get Aenirus out of her stupor “oh right, sorry I should explain this… *ahem* the ranking system is a system that governs the threat level that any being have, for example critters mostly have a rank of 0 while creatures that humans constantly call monsters have ranks above 0 for example, a common Swarmling the species I started out with has a rank of 0.4” She explained thoroughly.

“a threat rank is a way of classifying how dangerous a creature is to bipeds like humanoids since this is a system that they invented not by the system. They are classified based on how dangerous a creature is overall from their stats to skills to abilities to traits, magic, intelligence, etc…” she continued on “for example, a Swarmling has a rank of 0.4 which isn’t that threatening since most bipeds like humans have a rank of 1 for the common average of their species meaning pretty much anyone can deal with a swarmling since they are only ike 2-3ft long at most. However, Lesser Cave Serpent with its venom can be a bigger problem since whilst it’s stats are pretty similar, it has a 2 in threat rank thanks to its poison which can kill someone if they aren’t careful even if it can be killed quite easily, it is that threat that gives it its ranking”

“that’s… very relevant, why didn’t the threat ranking show up?” Tier asked rhetorically.

Because the threat rank system is made by bipeds like humanoids, you are a dungeon so you don’t have it turned on.

“wait… I can turn it on?” he asked out loud.

Affirmative.

“then turn it on than” Tier ordered.

Affirmative, you will now see the threat rankings of all creatures in your dungeon based on the ranking system of the bipedal races.

After the thing turned on, he could now feel something a bit different, he could now see the threat ranking of any of his creatures or any of his patterns, for example Kaide had a ranking of 1 whilst a regular kobold from the pattern has a threat ranking of 0.5 which was double that of the norm.

“well, glad I was able to help” Aenirus reminded Tier that he was not alone in this dungeon “right, this should be useful for a multitude of reasons” Tier responded gratefully “no problems, I am happy to help out” she added as Tier went back to work.

“Hey Aenirus, can you please tell me about any threats that may be in the caves ahead?” Tier asked nicely towards Aenirus “oh right… I forgot, I’m sorry about that but the only threats that I know of in this cave are the flying kanids, some lesser giant Varmilleons(rodents), maybe a lesser venomous cave serpent here or there but that greater version was probably the strongest thing in here though only because of its stealth and strong poison” she answered with detail “there may be something else… but I’m not sure about that one…” she added at the end.

“thank you Aenirus, but can you go over the threat ranking system again and what are humanoids?” Tier asked curiously “right, humanoids are a collection of sapient bipeds that holds extensive territory in the continent of the Midlands which we are currently on, we are in the central Wildlands, a free for all territory where no nations control but the closest settlement is from a surprisingly multi-raced nation called the Garrick Empire to the West” Aenirus explained “humans the most common of all humanoids are probably going to be the first sapient creatures that will find your dungeon but due to the long distance, your nonexistent mana burst which barely made it out of the cave system and the location in the Wildlands that I doubt there would be any humans coming inside your halls for possibly years unless they get very lucky” Aenirus summarized.

“also, threat rank determines how powerful a creature is using a biped as a baseline with an average human for reference being a rank 1 while an average human soldier is a rank 3.5, the highest rank is held by a surprising four way tie between three draconic species that I could not remember and… another draconic species… or was it an avian creature or a kind of… I don’t remember” Aenirus pondered as she continues.

“okay, so my first sapient customer will likely be humans… whatever they are and that might be years away due to our location” he surmised “which is bad for you since you grow faster if people bring impure mana to you instead of you having to draw it in and people dying also give you a nice boost” Aenirus continued to explain.

“either way, the humans and threat ranking system are not my concern as of right now and I really should be focusing hard on claiming the entire cave system” Tier admitted “don’t worry, I’ll be here if you need me” Aenirus assured him “and I’ll also be there for you if you need me Aenirus” Tier also reassured her.

Looking at her without a threat of looming death, she looks absolutely adorable to him with an amazingly fluffy brown feathered coat covering the soft smooth purple scales that ran over her entire body. To be honest, most of the creatures he summoned at least looked nice in his eyes… except that DAMN LAZY MONITOR THAT KEEPS SLEEPING ON THE JOB “WAKE UP YOU LAZY F****************----------------“

Due to the nature of what is about to happen, please enjoy a perspective of the small critter serpent that willingly entered and let itself be claimed by Tier’s dungeon mana a few hours ago…

Nameless critter serpent POV:

The cycle was normal, entered a nice cave away from the falling liquids, away from big green home, found a nice patch of green, slept on nice patch of green, loved mah nice patch of green, is soft and nicely warm for long body and is perfect largeness.

…

Woke up! Surge of energy came from deep within cave, friendly four legged sis went to check out, me sleep, not interested… patch of green is nice enough…no interests…

…

Woke up again, this time by nice flow of energy, nice comfy energy, want more better energy so go deep into rock hole, more rocks, more big rocks, slither stealthily to avoid hunters, am best hunter but there are bester hunters out around… keep peepers sharp and feelers sharperer…

…

Energy is close now, just need to go through last hole in… larger hole? Doen’t mattah, me best serpent, found energy home, there is a besterer hunter in energy home, seem nice so keep slithering, find better green around a small rock hill, I sleep…

Energy feel nice, feels warm like sun, is comfortable like mama, like energy… oh? Energy want in? okie, energy can come in, felt more comfy then ever, no hanger, no therst, no sleepiness but sleep still nice so sleep more…

…

…

Woke up by loud talking between bester hunter, sis and a presence? Mastah? Came to energy home, can understand mastah, mastah is nice, spares beterer hunter, me serve mastah now.

…

Mastah then started to yell at always sleeping big brother hunter, betererer but always sleep, is lazy, master’s patience has run out… huh? I spelled master correctly? Am I being smarter already? Dungeon home is incredible, learn new words, better… grammar! Feel a bit stronger, bit smarter, see the weird status icon thingy saying I can evolve?...

But feeling bored again, wanna sleep, all problems are for future I, I love dungeon home, love mah rock, love lots and lots…

…

Back to a Tier that has released all known energy reserves at getting a lazy Monitor to wake up and do its duty for once. Tier has had enough anger for one day though discovering he now has a rage trait just made him angrier ‘the system really is mocking me’ he thought but pushed it aside for more important things like it saying he was a day old now, he also learned that a day in this world was actually 32 hours which… was strange to him which also confirmed that he’s in another world or at least another habitable planet of some kind.

He felt a bit useless to be relying on the creatures… people he created to defend him but he does create them and give them a name including that small cure serpent still snuggling tightly around its small moss covered rock… it’s cute, everything looks nice as well even though an inner part of his mind is screaming about not having an actual ecosystem and also the room makes no sense so he really does need to get on with claiming the first floor quickly.

He starts to continue the process of taking his mana and pushing it out to expand his influence which would then allow him to claim basically anything inside his influence. He first claimed a small rocky hallway with many sharp rocks, it resembles an L if look from a top down perspective with North being up. The corridor or hallway or tunnel or whatever it’s called seems to go 6ft to the West with a 4ft width before taking a rough turn to the North before continuing for 13ft with a 7ft width to reach the next room.

It was a barren room almost square like with its 33ft diameter, there doesn’t seem to be anything in the room at all save for some stalagmites, stalactites, small boulders, rocks, more of those poisonous mushrooms that *cough, cough* mysteriously *cough* disappeared in his dungeon so he needs to make more, some cave shoots, cave dill, moss, common fungus, a small blue bouncing ball…. ‘wait what was that one again?’ Tier did a double take as he now actually focuses on the anomaly in the room he was claiming.

The thing was a small bouncing ball of gelatinous slime, on the ground it resembles a half sphere with a 4ft 3inches width, it was a light clear transparent watery blue with a small 8 sided crystalline octahedron inside with a 3cm height and diameter. In a way, the creature resembles himself a bit, a crystal being trapped inside a body yet his body is a dungeon while this creature’s body is made of gelatinous acid.

The thing is an abomination to the laws of physics and biology… that he remembers which made it very interesting to him but he didn’t have the time so he claimed it surprisingly quickly, tell it to not attack anything without orders, tell it to follow anything with higher intelligence and to go back to the room to play with Aenirus or something.

You now have access to the pattern: Lesser Slime (a smaller, lesser kind of slime, it is the start of its evolutionary tree, slimes are amorphous acidic creatures with a delicate magical core crystal inside of them, they are immune to any attacks that does not target their core crystals but any that does hit their core will almost surely instantly kill them, slimes can be found anywhere in the world)

Base Stats:

Strength - 10

Perception - 1

Endurance - 10

Dexterity - 1

Intelligence - 1

Wisdom - 1

Charisma - 1

Creativity - 1

Destiny - 1

Mysticism - 10

Karma - 1

Willpower - 1

Traits: Amorphous (allow the user to slip into or out of any space as long as there is a gap); Extreme buoyancy (the user cannot enter water and will only really skitter across the surface); light acidic body (the user’s body is coated in a light acidic substance);Physical Damage immunity (any physical attack that does not hit a weak spot does no damage whatsoever); Fire vulnerability (user is weak to heat based damage); Lightning vulnerability (user is weak to electricity based damage); Sonic vulnerability (user is weak to sound based damage)

Skills: Slime Shot (lv.10) (main attack of slimes, user bounce towards any target it can or has sense with high speed to latch onto and eat or until they hit a surface)

Threat Ranking: 0.8

‘huh, it seems like some of the guards are moving up as I claimed the room, I’m so proud of them for moving up on their own, not needing me to command them all the time is such a blessing, flexibility is one of the most important part of an army after all’ Tier felt proud of himself “nice job guys, leave the slime alone, continue to train and you should be good, sleeping is fine if you feel tired but don’t sleep too much” the last part had some acid in it which made the monitor yelp before staring like a statue at the next hallway.

‘anyways, onto the next hallway’ Tier thought as he ignores a cry of excitement from Aenirus thanks to his unique awareness whilst also seeing her speed up to it at blinding speed to start poking and prodding yelling a cry of “YES!” as she realized that it cannot actual hurt her due to its orders so she went and do stuff that a young child would do when they got a new toy.

“your sacrifice will not be in vain slime… it is fortunate that you do not have sentience” Tier heard Kaide salute the slime in gratitude before going back to force feeding a particularly bad mannered kobold Galdra some poisonous mushrooms for insubordination or something, he didn’t really pay much attention to that since the situation seems to have been resolved ‘… I do not think my dungeon is supposed to be this way, I am definitely sure that dungeons are not supposed to be this way but… I am happy nonetheless’ Tier thought as he smiled internally in his mind, he missed having a body and if the shenanigans continue than he would be mostly contempt for this life.

‘where was I again…… OH RIGHT! The expansion, random events keep distracting me’ Tier remembered before going back to work again on his dungeon. Going through the unnecessarily winding and long 4ft hallways, he entered upon a rectangleish room about 60ft from West to East and 45ft from South to North. Entering from the North Eastern corner from the tunnel that was about 28ft long, this room takes the cake for new territory for now as there were large boulders, stalagmites, stalactites, a large amount of cave dill, cave shoots, more mushrooms both edible and poisonous but the best thing was the score plus a few more of Flying Kanids in the room which he claimed all of after an entire hour of focusing.

Congratulation, you earned the achievement: Claimant: by claiming more than twenty creatures that are not considered critters, claiming additional creatures will be easier and faster.

‘nice, a new achievement, I will gladly take that thank you very much as I claim the rest of the creatures in here, don’t think I didn’t see you little Varmilleon fellow’ Tier talked to himself again as he went to claim a couple of Varmilleons this time that were much larger than the critter variant he had though only by a foot.

You now have access to the pattern: Lesser Giant Cave Varmilleon (rodents): Varmilleons are deemed as pest by pretty much every intelligent sapient race as they steal food, carry diseases and spread plague. Giant variant grow large enough to be considered a threat as they can carry a nasty bite laced with disease or plague. Cave Varmilleons do not carry any nasties as they live in caves far away from any sapients yet receive the same treatments as their city dwelling/sewer dwelling kin but they do have increased stats to make up for it even if they are not as deadly.

Base Stats:

Strength - 9

Perception - 8

Endurance – 10

Dexterity - 8

Intelligence - 7

Wisdom - 8

Charisma - 4

Creativity - 3

Destiny - 5

Mysticism - 2

Karma - 8

Willpower – 3

Traits: Strength of the Swarm (the user attack strength increases when fighting in a group, +10% increase to damage for every nearby allies that attack the same target)

Abilities: Burrowing (lv.3) (allow user to dig small burrows or tunnels)

Threat Ranking: 0.2

‘alright, nothing else except for critters that should be automatically claimed if that small cute critter serpent was anything to go by so onto the next room’ This time he went through a straight 5ft wide 17ft long tunnel going from East to West on the middle of the West wall from the room he was just in. As he entered the next room from the Eastern wall, he found nothing of real interest in the 24ft wide square room but got a material blueprint for some soil and a grass seed which excited him as he knew the cave was ending soon.

He went on to the South Western wall of the room following his flowing influence to claim as he focuses most of his mental abilities to claiming the 8ft wide 18ft long slightly winding hallway through to the Northern wall of the next rough 15ft radius circle room with more soil and even some grass growing thanks to some luminescent mushrooms which he found out were called Shine Cave Mushrooms.

He then made a discovery as both the East and West wall contains a hallway going to another room in the cave system. He could feel a light breeze coming from the West as he could also hear Aenirus and Kaide talking about proficiencies and what they do which distracted him a bit.

“…o let me get this straight if I’m remembering correctly… It goes from Novice to Amateur to Trained to Proficient to Journeyman to Professional to Expert to Elite to Master and finally to Legend” Kaide seemed to reply to previous statement from Aenirus who replies with “correct, the step from Novice to Trained is admittedly very easy but after Proficient… you’re going to feel no growth for a long time and if you do somehow manage to get to Legend then… you’re going to have to deal with some very problematic characters” the same information he already knew by speaking with the advisor thingy… at least he wasn’t the only one in the dark this time…

Not wanting to interrupt their banter at all Tier refocuses on the Hallway leading East as he does not wat to be blindsighted by an attack to his rear or have to defend from two angles at once. The tunnel starts of at 7ft wide but grows as the loose rock mixed with soil starts widening up to 10ft as it stretches 48ft to a long Rectangular room 53ft going from West to East and 22ft from North to South.

The room was well lit by bioluminescent Shine Cave Mushrooms showing some large boulders, a raised cliff like section which showed that this room has a height of 53ft instead of the regular 10-16ft ceiling from the other rooms. The cliff was about 35ft high with the width only being 6ft at the widest section with some loose rocks on top of it, there was the usual mix of small boulders, stalagmites, stalactites, cave dill, cave shoots, moss, new red moss, some new mushroom alongside the same old batch and the large dark brown furred beast eating a smaller Lesser Cave Serpent… hmmm… one of those things don’t add up… maybe the red moss? Or the new mushrooms…

‘shit, there’s something there’ Tier thought ‘maybe I can claim it… let’s get the others to come here first thou- huh its leaving’ His worries evaporated as the creature had its fill of Serpent meat and started to trot out of the cave system. After a good ten minutes of waiting… Tier claimed some space from the 8ft wide hallway to the West before creating an 8ft deep pit filled with sharp stone spikes alongside a heavy stone door as a precaution just in case it came back.

Thankfully as Tier claimed the new room it was evident that it was not a den or nest of any kind but just a place the creature came to get away from the still pouring rain outside and get a free meal as a bonus. ‘rent a nice cozy rain free cave, you also get a free meal of Serpent meat as well though it sounds like the rain is subsiding so that might be the reason it left’ Tier thought as he claims the room the creature was in finding it devoid of any other creatures except a few critter insects and another critter Serpent.

You now have access to the blueprint(s): Blood Moss (a rare type of moss growing in dim light conditions, is a sought after as ingredient for many mystical practices, can be eaten raw to relieve stress, gain energy or rubbed on wounds to disinfect or help aid in scabbing and will even heal the mental and spiritual health of a target); Red Helm Mushroom (an edible herb like mushroom considered a delicacy in many parts of the world of Ardalesh, used in some minor alchemical practices, useful especially in stamina potions)

After all of that, he went to claim the last room after a final 40ft long winding 8ft wide hallway ending in the south of the room, he managed to find the entrance being a 20ft radius half circle with the half to the West being replaced by a 20ft by 40ft cave opening where he could see out of where he realized that he was situated on the base of a mountain of some kind. He could feel the damp air as it comes into his dungeon right after a long storm, he caught the tail end of the clouds rolling away being replaced by an early morning sun complete with a rainbow.

Glancing out after expanding his claimed territory about 10ft out he could see grass, trees, hills, afar off river and even what seems like a village or town if he really peered out to the East though even at the almost 2km long distance he could clearly see it has been abandoned for a while. All of which seemed too far away from him, he also saw that creature again moving to a small wooded area to the south and some herbivores munching on the fresh grass after an intense storm.

As he admired the beauty, he saw a message popped up onto his screen, one that he himself was very excited about:

You have finished creating your first floor, you can now move on to create additional floors as well as assign a creature as the boss of the first floor, you may now modify your creatures…

He ignored the rest of the message as it reiterates some things Aenirus told him or he already asked about because now… the fun can begin now that he can modify his creatures but for now… he needs some rest as he felt his mana reserves start to fall below 50% after he finished claiming the cave and it is tactically idiotic to run at less than half your energy or fighting force so he withdrew for now to gather up his forces and prepares for when his energy reaches full again and drifts off to sleep after greeting the others and giving the usual orders of do whatever you want….

…

‘hold the fuck on, didn’t I turned this fucking automatic sleep thing off?’ Tier thought angrily as he then went and screamed accusations at the apologizing advisor to the system that did not understand his accusations as his rage builds up…

…

…

Extra Fact: Slimes... are cute to many people...

Extra Extra Fact: Many different people find different things cute...